The background description provided herein is for the purpose of generally presenting the context of the disclosure. Work of the presently named inventors, to the extent it is described in this background section, as well as aspects of the description that may not otherwise qualify as prior art at the time of filing, are neither expressly nor impliedly admitted as prior art against the present disclosure. Unless otherwise indicated herein, the approaches described in this section are not prior art to the claims in the present disclosure and are not admitted to be prior art by inclusion in this section.
Devices may use wireless technology such as bar codes, Bluetooth and near field communication (“NFC”) to communicate with each other directly when in close proximity. For instance, a mobile phone and a point-of-sale device respectively equipped with NFC components may communicate with each other to facilitate a transaction. A customer may use the mobile phone to purchase a product by placing it within a close proximity of, or even by tapping it against, the point-of-sale device, to cause a deduction of funds, equivalent to the price of the product, from the user's bank account.